L'esorcismo - Ultimo atto

Anthony Miller (Russell Crowe) gets hired on a movie project which resembles The Exorcist (1973). He's trying to reconnect with his estranged daughter Lee Miller (Ryan Simpkins) and both are still dealing with her mother's death. In addition, Anthony has other past issues which may be resurfacing.

This project probably started with an interesting meta idea. The movie is rather muddled in the beginning, but it is mostly tired. If there is one word to describe this, it is tired. The characters are all tired. The actors are tired. The story feels tired even with its meta covering. This is dark and gloomy and tired.

I remember seeing the trailer for this movie and thinking it was some sort of sequel to The Pope's Exorcist, but its not. Its not related at all and yet it feels like the same movie. Odd!

Not sure what's going on with Russell Crowe's career. I know that some stars get older and phase out, forced to do lower value movies or take supporting roles over leads in bigger ones but what was the crime to Hollywood Russell Crowe committed to have to do such bad movies other than him getting fat?

(What? Don't act like that's not a crime in Hollywood?) From my perspective the movie is filled with well enough known names: Adam Goldberg Chole Bailey. David Hyde Pierce is in this movie! David High Pierce! I known it's been a while sense Fraser has been on the air but I feel like Miles Crane must give the movie some star power. And Sam Worthington! This was a real puzzle. Did Worthington owe someone money? Does the filmmaker have something on this dude that would get him canceled?

I can only imagine what this movie was suppose to be is sitting somewhere on a cutting room floor in Hollywood cause this is not making sense. It's amazing how someone could have watched this movie and thought this was going to fly and I can only assume what Crowe signed up for and filmed was totally different than the finished product.

I can clearly see a good idea that just was not done well at all.

Why have exorcism movies become all the rage again? It's such a defeated sub-genre. There's no life left in it. I was really hoping 'The Exorcism' was going to do something unique or throw a twist on the concept. But no, it had nothing new to offer.

The only time this film really worked was during the interesting little glimpses behind the scenes of the movie within a movie being filmed. Like it wasn't overly captivating cinema, but compared to the tired "horror" the film was trying to put forward it was at least something with a pulse.

I never cared about the fate of any of the characters and never felt my heart-rate raise a single beat. This one was a miss. 4/10.

Giving this an 6/10 rating

Gets above 5 because Russell Crowe is good, as is David Hyde Pierce, Chloe Bailey is great, Adam Goldberg plays quite the unlikeable man in this, and it's really the performances that are good, the film is not enough, and at least it does have some good horror in it, as in a few good deaths, effects are good, it uses light, very well.

The set up is fine, the film is played out into day sessions, and Crowe's character goes deeper into the hell hole. It's not really that scary, but again, you have good acting but nothing really else that helps you feel that this is been done before, More needed on the characters and story please, think this might of been a rush job to get this one out, it's a disappointing film, not worth the trip unless you watch the trailer and it suits you.

The other big problem is that he played this character that is so similar in 'The Pope's Exorcist', a few months back, and a sequel is coming for that, go watch that instead of this. Like I wrote above, some good acting is why I gave it a 6 instead of a 5.

The scene setting to start was good, strong pacing and intriguing.

Unfortunately it never developed from there...loose story line, there was never any reason behind the occurrences of the film.

What relation did any of the references have to the story line? You'd have to see it for this to be a spoiler... and I don't personally think you should...

What happened to the characters?

Would I recommend this film? Simply put, no, spend your money watching something else!

It's a shame watching a film with Russell Crowe headlining and coming away from it saying.. why has he decided to star in this movie? Is this a sign his acting career has possibly seen better days?

If you want a few cheap jump scares go for it, but you've been warned!!